“Such a remark is unworthy of you, Holmes. It shows me very clearly the
state of your own nerves. But if you have no confidence in me I would
not intrude my services. Let me bring Sir Jasper Meek or Penrose
Fisher, or any of the best men in London. But someone you _must_ have,
and that is final. If you think that I am going to stand here and see
you die without either helping you myself or bringing anyone else to
help you, then you have mistaken your man.”
“You mean well, Watson,” said the sick man with something between a sob
and a groan. “Shall I demonstrate your own ignorance? What do you know,
pray, of Tapanuli fever? What do you know of the black Formosa
corruption?”
“I have never heard of either.”
“There are many problems of disease, many strange pathological
possibilities, in the East, Watson.” He paused after each sentence to
collect his failing strength. “I have learned so much during some
recent researches which have a medico-criminal aspect. It was in the
course of them that I contracted this complaint. You can do nothing.”
“Possibly not. But I happen to know that Dr. Ainstree, the greatest
living authority upon tropical disease, is now in London. All
remonstrance is useless, Holmes, I am going this instant to fetch him.”
I turned resolutely to the door.
Never have I had such a shock! In an instant, with a tiger-spring, the
dying man had intercepted me. I heard the sharp snap of a twisted key.
The next moment he had staggered back to his bed, exhausted and panting
after his one tremendous outflame of energy.
“You won’t take the key from me by force, Watson. I’ve got you, my
friend. Here you are, and here you will stay until I will otherwise.
But I’ll humour you.” (All this in little gasps, with terrible
struggles for breath between.) “You’ve only my own good at heart. Of
course I know that very well. You shall have your way, but give me time
to get my strength. Not now, Watson, not now. It’s four o’clock. At six
you can go.”
“This is insanity, Holmes.”
“Only two hours, Watson. I promise you will go at six. Are you content
to wait?”
“I seem to have no choice.”
“None in the world, Watson. Thank you, I need no help in arranging the
clothes. You will please keep your distance. Now, Watson, there is one
other condition that I would make. You will seek help, not from the man
you mention, but from the one that I choose.”
“By all means.”
“The first three sensible words that you have uttered since you entered
this room, Watson. You will find some books over there. I am somewhat
exhausted; I wonder how a battery feels when it pours electricity into
a non-conductor? At six, Watson, we resume our conversation.”
But it was destined to be resumed long before that hour, and in
circumstances which gave me a shock hardly second to that caused by his
spring to the door. I had stood for some minutes looking at the silent
figure in the bed. His face was almost covered by the clothes and he
appeared to be asleep. Then, unable to settle down to reading, I walked
slowly round the room, examining the pictures of celebrated criminals
with which every wall was adorned. Finally, in my aimless
perambulation, I came to the mantelpiece. A litter of pipes,
tobacco-pouches, syringes, penknives, revolver-cartridges, and other
_débris_ was scattered over it. In the midst of these was a small black
and white ivory box with a sliding lid. It was a neat little thing, and
I had stretched out my hand to examine it more closely, when——
It was a dreadful cry that he gave—a yell which might have been heard
down the street. My skin went cold and my hair bristled at that
horrible scream. As I turned I caught a glimpse of a convulsed face and
frantic eyes. I stood paralysed, with the little box in my hand.
“Put it down! Down, this instant, Watson—this instant, I say!” His head
sank back upon the pillow and he gave a deep sigh of relief as I
replaced the box upon the mantelpiece. “I hate to have my things
touched, Watson. You know that I hate it. You fidget me beyond
endurance. You, a doctor—you are enough to drive a patient into an
asylum. Sit down, man, and let me have my rest!”
The incident left a most unpleasant impression upon my mind. The
violent and causeless excitement, followed by this brutality of speech,
so far removed from his usual suavity, showed me how deep was the
disorganisation of his mind. Of all ruins, that of a noble mind is the
most deplorable. I sat in silent dejection until the stipulated time
had passed. He seemed to have been watching the clock as well as I, for
it was hardly six before he began to talk with the same feverish
animation as before.
“Now, Watson,” said he. “Have you any change in your pocket?”
“Yes.”
“Any silver?”
“A good deal.”
“How many half-crowns?”
“I have five.”
“Ah, too few! Too few! How very unfortunate, Watson! However, such as
they are you can put them in your watchpocket. And all the rest of your
money in your left trouser pocket. Thank you. It will balance you so
much better like that.”
This was raving insanity. He shuddered, and again made a sound between
a cough and a sob.
“You will now light the gas, Watson, but you will be very careful that
not for one instant shall it be more than half on. I implore you to be
careful, Watson. Thank you, that is excellent. No, you need not draw
the blind. Now you will have the kindness to place some letters and
papers upon this table within my reach. Thank you. Now some of that
litter from the mantelpiece. Excellent, Watson! There is a sugar-tongs
there. Kindly raise that small ivory box with its assistance. Place it
here among the papers. Good! You can now go and fetch Mr. Culverton
Smith, of 13, Lower Burke Street.”
To tell the truth, my desire to fetch a doctor had somewhat weakened,
for poor Holmes was so obviously delirious that it seemed dangerous to
leave him. However, he was as eager now to consult the person named as
he had been obstinate in refusing.
“I never heard the name,” said I.
“Possibly not, my good Watson. It may surprise you to know that the man
upon earth who is best versed in this disease is not a medical man, but
a planter. Mr. Culverton Smith is a well-known resident of Sumatra, now
visiting London. An outbreak of the disease upon his plantation, which
was distant from medical aid, caused him to study it himself, with some
rather far-reaching consequences. He is a very methodical person, and I
did not desire you to start before six, because I was well aware that
you would not find him in his study. If you could persuade him to come
here and give us the benefit of his unique experience of this disease,
the investigation of which has been his dearest hobby, I cannot doubt
that he could help me.”
I gave Holmes’s remarks as a consecutive whole and will not attempt to
indicate how they were interrupted by gaspings for breath and those
clutchings of his hands which indicated the pain from which he was
suffering. His appearance had changed for the worse during the few
hours that I had been with him. Those hectic spots were more
pronounced, the eyes shone more brightly out of darker hollows, and a
cold sweat glimmered upon his brow. He still retained, however, the
jaunty gallantry of his speech. To the last gasp he would always be the
master.
“You will tell him exactly how you have left me,” said he. “You will
convey the very impression which is in your own mind—a dying man—a
dying and delirious man. Indeed, I cannot think why the whole bed of
the ocean is not one solid mass of oysters, so prolific the creatures
seem. Ah, I am wandering! Strange how the brain controls the brain!
What was I saying, Watson?”
“My directions for Mr. Culverton Smith.”
“Ah, yes, I remember. My life depends upon it. Plead with him, Watson.
There is no good feeling between us. His nephew, Watson—I had
suspicions of foul play and I allowed him to see it. The boy died
horribly. He has a grudge against me. You will soften him, Watson. Beg
him, pray him, get him here by any means. He can save me—only he!”
“I will bring him in a cab, if I have to carry him down to it.”
“You will do nothing of the sort. You will persuade him to come. And
then you will return in front of him. Make any excuse so as not to come
with him. Don’t forget, Watson. You won’t fail me. You never did fail
me. No doubt there are natural enemies which limit the increase of the
creatures. You and I, Watson, we have done our part. Shall the world,
then, be overrun by oysters? No, no; horrible! You’ll convey all that
is in your mind.”
I left him full of the image of this magnificent intellect babbling
like a foolish child. He had handed me the key, and with a happy
thought I took it with me lest he should lock himself in. Mrs. Hudson
was waiting, trembling and weeping, in the passage. Behind me as I
passed from the flat I heard Holmes’s high, thin voice in some
delirious chant. Below, as I stood whistling for a cab, a man came on
me through the fog.
“How is Mr. Holmes, sir?” he asked.
It was an old acquaintance, Inspector Morton, of Scotland Yard, dressed
in unofficial tweeds.
“He is very ill,” I answered.
He looked at me in a most singular fashion. Had it not been too
fiendish, I could have imagined that the gleam of the fanlight showed
exultation in his face.
“I heard some rumour of it,” said he.
The cab had driven up, and I left him.
Lower Burke Street proved to be a line of fine houses lying in the
vague borderland between Notting Hill and Kensington. The particular
one at which my cabman pulled up had an air of smug and demure
respectability in its old-fashioned iron railings, its massive
folding-door, and its shining brasswork. All was in keeping with a
solemn butler who appeared framed in the pink radiance of a tinted
electrical light behind him.
“Yes, Mr. Culverton Smith is in. Dr. Watson! Very good, sir, I will
take up your card.”
My humble name and title did not appear to impress Mr. Culverton Smith.
Through the half-open door I heard a high, petulant, penetrating voice.
“Who is this person? What does he want? Dear me, Staples, how often
have I said that I am not to be disturbed in my hours of study?”
There came a gentle flow of soothing explanation from the butler.
“Well, I won’t see him, Staples. I can’t have my work interrupted like
this. I am not at home. Say so. Tell him to come in the morning if he
really must see me.”
Again the gentle murmur.
“Well, well, give him that message. He can come in the morning, or he
can stay away. My work must not be hindered.”
I thought of Holmes tossing upon his bed of sickness and counting the
minutes, perhaps, until I could bring help to him. It was not a time to
stand upon ceremony. His life depended upon my promptness. Before the
apologetic butler had delivered his message I had pushed past him and
was in the room.
With a shrill cry of anger a man rose from a reclining chair beside the
fire. I saw a great yellow face, coarse-grained and greasy, with heavy,
double-chin, and two sullen, menacing grey eyes which glared at me from
under tufted and sandy brows. A high bald head had a small velvet
smoking-cap poised coquettishly upon one side of its pink curve. The
skull was of enormous capacity, and yet as I looked down I saw to my
amazement that the figure of the man was small and frail, twisted in
the shoulders and back like one who has suffered from rickets in his
childhood.
“What’s this?” he cried in a high, screaming voice. “What is the
meaning of this intrusion? Didn’t I send you word that I would see you
to-morrow morning?”
“I am sorry,” said I, “but the matter cannot be delayed. Mr. Sherlock
Holmes—”
The mention of my friend’s name had an extraordinary effect upon the
little man. The look of anger passed in an instant from his face. His
features became tense and alert.
“Have you come from Holmes?” he asked.
“I have just left him.”
“What about Holmes? How is he?”
“He is desperately ill. That is why I have come.”
The man motioned me to a chair, and turned to resume his own. As he did
so I caught a glimpse of his face in the mirror over the mantelpiece. I
could have sworn that it was set in a malicious and abominable smile.
Yet I persuaded myself that it must have been some nervous contraction
which I had surprised, for he turned to me an instant later with
genuine concern upon his features.
“I am sorry to hear this,” said he. “I only know Mr. Holmes through
some business dealings which we have had, but I have every respect for
his talents and his character. He is an amateur of crime, as I am of
disease. For him the villain, for me the microbe. There are my
prisons,” he continued, pointing to a row of bottles and jars which
stood upon a side table. “Among those gelatine cultivations some of the
very worst offenders in the world are now doing time.”
“It was on account of your special knowledge that Mr. Holmes desired to
see you. He has a high opinion of you and thought that you were the one
man in London who could help him.”
The little man started, and the jaunty smoking-cap slid to the floor.
“Why?” he asked. “Why should Mr. Holmes think that I could help him in
his trouble?”
“Because of your knowledge of Eastern diseases.”
“But why should he think that this disease which he has contracted is
Eastern?”
“Because, in some professional inquiry, he has been working among
Chinese sailors down in the docks.”
Mr. Culverton Smith smiled pleasantly and picked up his smoking-cap.
“Oh, that’s it—is it?” said he. “I trust the matter is not so grave as
you suppose. How long has he been ill?”
“About three days.”
“Is he delirious?”
“Occasionally.”
“Tut, tut! This sounds serious. It would be inhuman not to answer his
call. I very much resent any interruption to my work, Dr. Watson, but
this case is certainly exceptional. I will come with you at once.”